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Thank you Ilanthar!
Now I have to decide on a style for the map. Originally, I wanted to do something along the lines of a 1900s map, but I feel like doing that would not do justice to the project. I've built the geography, climates, biomes, peoples, cultures and languages, I think this maps deserves something a bit more unique and in line with the worldbuilding spirit.
I have a few criteria the style must fulfill:
- It has to be different, the map is for another world, so it has to feel like it comes from it.
- It will use contour lines, I did some research on representations of relief, and I think contours are my best bet. Besides, I'm not gonna let that effort go to waste.
- It has to feel authentic, it has to look like something people would have made and used. Because of this it must also be practical.
- It will be a political map, showing national and internal borders, important settlements and major roads.
So, let's analyse the issue. The different styles used for every map ever are conditioned by the tools and resources available to make said map. Medieval maps looked like that because they were hand drawn and there was no complex information available. 19th century maps looked like that because they were printed with copper plates and because there wasn't detailed elevation information available. 20th century maps looked like that because of lithography and halftone printing combined with hand drawing. Modern maps look like that because of digital technologies and libraries of information and offset printing.
For the sake of my sanity I'm not going to deal with developing printing techniques, that's just overkill. Instead I'm gonna assume a real world progress of technology.
The world I'm building is set on a medieval time period with cultures being similar to east european and asian cultures such as the mongols and sami people. I'd like to make a map that is chronically consistent with the world, but I won't. Medieval maps simply don't have the level of accuracy I want for this project, so I'll have to settle for an anachronistic map style.
The use of contour lines (one of my requisites) became common during the early 20th century, when technology allowed people to measure elevation more easily. This means that I have offset and lithography at my disposal for 'printing' the map, I'd like to keep it looking old, and lithographic printing has a feel I personally like, so I'll choose that for printing technology. The technique I developed I the first page is good for a more hand drawn approach, but I think I can adapt it to fit the lithographic look.
Now that I know the technologic constraints placed on the map, I can focus on the artistic style.
I want my people to look like the bastard child of tibetan, japonic and saami cultures. A people who place a strong value in the spiritual and the aesthetic, so I know I want a map with a strong use of colors and patterns.
For some reason I also feel like seals or stamps are the kind of thing that would be used widely as an identity mark by this culture, just like coats of arms IRL. The use of these seals could play an important role in the map, because even within a single nation, society and lands are divided in clans, which would be marked in the map.
Well, this is as far as I can get without actually experimenting with different styles. I will post again when I have something more concrete.
